In the setting of high patient volumes and boarding times across many emergency departments
(EDs), clinicians are increasingly tasked with the challenge of managing patients
in nonconventional care areas
[
[1]
]. The use of hallway care areas, locations where patients are in close proximity to
one another with little or no structural partitions separating them, has increased
[
2
,
3
]. Several negative consequences of ED hallway care have been noted, including patient
perceptions of compromised care
[
[4]
] and poor infection prevention practices among staff
[
[5]
]. However, the impact of hallway care on clinician-patient communication has not been
studied. Clinician-patient communication is an important aspect of care associated
with decreased patient anxiety and patient satisfaction
[
[6]
]. Clinician-patient communication may be particularly important for patients evaluated
for potentially life-threatening conditions such as acute coronary syndrome (ACS).
Our study examined the association between hallway care during ED evaluation for ACS
and patients' perception of clinician-patient communication. We hypothesized that
hallway care would be associated with poorer perception of clinician-patient communication
compared with patients receiving care in curtained or divided rooms.To read this article in full you will need to make a payment
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References
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Article Info
Publication History
Published online: March 02, 2016
Accepted:
February 29,
2016
Received in revised form:
February 27,
2016
Received:
February 24,
2016
Footnotes
☆Grant: This work was supported by grants HL117832 , HL123368 , and HL128310 from the National Institutes of Health/National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute .
☆☆Meetings: To be presented at the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine Annual Conference, New Orleans, LA, May 22, 2016 (accepted for oral presentation).
Identification
Copyright
© 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
